


Are You My Mother?

by IWannaBeYahtzee



Category: The Walking Dead (Telltale Video Game)
Genre: Clem doing her best, Clementine is best mom, Episode: s04e01 Done Running, Hard talks, Loss of Parent(s), Mother-Son Relationship, Parent-Child Relationship, Parenthood, Sad with a Happy Ending, Surrogate motherhood, Tags Are Hard, Teenage Parents, The Talk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-01
Updated: 2018-10-01
Packaged: 2019-07-21 00:42:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16148951
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IWannaBeYahtzee/pseuds/IWannaBeYahtzee
Summary: The topic Clementine always dreaded comes up.





	Are You My Mother?

She had just gotten AJ settled down for bed and was drifting off herself when the big question came.

"Clem?"

"Yeah?"

"What happened to my real mom?"

Clementine had known this question was coming...eventually. That doesn't stop her sitting up in bed with the force of the surprise of just how much this question hurts. She almost wants to reply _"Am I not enough of a mom for you?!"_. But instead she says "What do you mean?"

AJ sits up as well, his little legs dangling off the side of the bed. "Well, you and I don't look alike. So you can't have been my real mom. So I must have come from somewhere else."

Clementine takes a deep breath to shoo away the troublesome pangs in her chest ('he's just a kid Clem. Kids are blunt assholes sometimes.') and to prepare her for the long difficult talk ahead. "Okay kiddo," she says, patting the bed next to her. "C'mon over here. We gotta have a talk."

"Is this the one about the birds and the bees?" He asks, climbing up onto the bed.

Clementine turns to look at him horrified "What?!"

"Willy told me that when I get older someone's gonna have to tell me about the birds and the bees. But I told him I already know what birds and bees are. He said it was some kinda special talk that grown-ups have with kids? Is that what this is?" AJ asks.

Clementine shakes her head. "No. No. Not until you're a little older."

"Okay."

There's silence for a bit. Clementine doesn't know where to begin telling this kid about this but she figures she'll start with the question that's wearing on her mind.

"When did you begin to notice that we we're different, buddy?"

AJ scrunches up his face the way he does when he's thinking really hard about something and Clem can't help but feel the corner of her mouth quirk up in a half smile.

"I think I've know for a long time. I just didn't really pay attention to it. But then I noticed that me and Louis and Tenn look a lot more alike than you and I do, and I started thinking about it more. Then earlier I was drawing with Tenn and we started talking about you and Tenn asked if you were my mom. And I realized...I didn't know. You've always been there as long as I can remember so I figured you must be but Tenn said that you were too young and it didn't make sense." AJ face scrunches up again but this time it was in a sad and confused kinda way.

Clem always knew AJ was too smart for his own good. "Well your right about one thing bud, I'm not your mom. Your _birth_ mom anyway." Clementine explains.

"Then...where did I come from?"

There it was. The question she had been dreading for years. Clem lets out a deep sigh and begins.

"When I was younger, only a little older than you actually, I was alone. I had lost the last friend I had left and was just... wandering by myself. But then I found another group. They didn't take too kindly to me at first. But tensions were probably so high because one of the women in the group, Rebecca, was pregnant."

"That was my mom wasn't it?" AJ interjects excitedly.

Clementine smiles and says "Yup. She was with her husband Alvin-"

"But my names Alvin." AJ interrupts again.

"Right again. We named you after him." Clem says.

"We?"

"Kenny and I." She had often told him stories about the man. 

A troubled look crosses AJ's face. Like he's already figured it out. "Then...then did something happen to him? My dad?"

Smart kid. Too smart.

Clem frowns. "He...he died protecting me and your mother. He was a very brave man AJ. And he loved you and your mom more than anything . He really wanted to meet you."

AJ stares at the floor with a solemn look on his face. He doesn't react otherwise. "What about my mom?"

Clem furrows her brow as she scratches at wounds long healed over and dreges up old memories. "It took a lot but we finally found a nice warm place for her to have you. She got to meet you. She loved you so much, AJ. But...winter was coming. The cold was setting in fast and we had to move. The labor was so hard on her...she didn't make it."

Clementine was somewhat surprised when she heard sniffling at her side. Looking down AJ's cheeks are streaked with tears. Clementine couldn't remember the last time AJ had cried, not since he was a baby. Clem wraps an arm around him and draws him close to her side.

She suddenly feels so guilty. Her family may have been taken from her when she was ridiculously young but at least she got to know what a family was like. AJ will never know and that crushes her. She feels her eyes getting teary as she rubs her little boys back and whispers "I'm sorry AJ! I'm sorry you never got to meet your dad! I'm sorry you never got to have a mom!"

AJ pulls out of her grasp, wipes his eyes and says "But you're my mom, Clem!"

Well, if she wasn't crying before she is now. "W-what?"

AJ rubs at his eyes again as he explains. "I know that Rebbeca and Alvin are the parents that borned me and everything, and I'm sad that I'll never get to meet them. But you've always taken care of me. You've been there no matter what. I love you, Clem."

Oh fuck, now she's basically sobbing. She crushes AJ into the biggest bear hug she can possibly give him. "I love you too, my little goofball."

And just this once, AJ doesn't even correct her.


End file.
